Zimbabwe Protest Strike Continues 3rd Day

Published 8:00 pm, Thursday, April 24, 2003

A national strike against higher gas prices kept many stores closed across Zimbabwe on Friday, the third day of protests that have crippled much of the economy.

The government imposed gas price increases of up to 300 percent last week. The increases were meant to ease acute fuel shortages by helping the state pay suppliers.

Zimbabwe is suffering its worst economic crisis since independence from British colonial rule in 1980, with acute shortages of food, gas, medicine and other imports.

Most stores remained closed in the main cities, which are opposition strongholds, but some banks reopened for payday.

Factory owners reported more workers showing up at their jobs to collect their monthly pay, but estimated about half the industries in the capital, Harare, were closed.

Lines of people waited at banks to redeem pay checks. Bank staff said shortages of cash were expected because little business was carried out on the first two days of the strike, slashing deposits by commercial firms.

The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, the main federation of labor groups that called the work stoppage, estimated up to 70 percent of the country's businesses were shut on Wednesday and Thursday.

The government has declared the strike illegal under stringent security laws that have outlawed anti-government demonstrations.

The government, stung by the effectiveness of the stoppage, accused factory and shop owners of locking out workers and has threatened to withdraw the licenses of bus owners who refused to ferry commuters to work.

The government has repeatedly accused Britain, the former colonial power, and the United States of backing efforts to oust President Robert Mugabe.

Mugabe, at the state funeral of provincial governor Stephen Nkomo, returned to his theme of blaming Western powers for fueling dissent against him.

"Our enemies now seek desperately to divide us and plunge this country back into the dungeon of colonialism," he said.

The labor federation is closely affiliated with the country's main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, which organized a two-day strike last month that also shut down most of the economy.

Later Friday, the opposition said 30 of its officials were arrested in a raid on the party's Harare offices.

No reason was given for the arrests of Morgan Femai, the party's provincial chairman for Harare; Tendayi Nyamshana, its director of security, and Nomore Sibanda, an elections co-ordinator and other senior administrative and clerical staff, the Movement for Democratic Change said in a statement.

Police were not immediately available for comment. Sibanda is a former labor federation official working for the labor-backed opposition.

The opposition has pledged to step up a campaign of strikes and demonstrations to demand democratic reform in Zimbabwe and drive Mugabe from office.